BUNGLING Mark Sedwill said he was "concerned" about the missing child abuse files but confessed that he did not know what was in the films - or why they vanished.

THE top civil servant at the Home Office told MPs yesterday that 114 files linked to claims of child abuse by politicians had probably been destroyed.

Bungling Mark Sedwill said he was “concerned” about the missing papers.

But he insisted that people “should not assume that there is anything sinister” in their disappearance.

In a string of embarrassing admissions, Sedwill confessed that he did not know what was in the files.

He also admitted Home Secretary Theresa May was not told about the missing files at the outset.

And she was not given the full report he commissioned into the disappearance of the papers.

Sedwill said: “Most of these files were probably destroyed because the kinds of topics that they covered would have been subject to the normal file destruction procedures that were in place at that time.

“But they can’t be confirmed to be destroyed because there isn’t a proper log of what was destroyed and what wasn’t.”

Keith Vaz, who chairs the Commons Home Affairs select committee, compared the department’s handling of the situation to the plot of a spy novel.

Last year, Sedwill brought in an unnamed investigator to look at documents detailing alleged paedophile activity at Westminster. The investigation found no record of specific claims of abuse by prominent public figures. But it has emerged 114 files dating from 1979 to 1999 have vanished.

When he faced the select committee yesterday, Sedwill refused to identify the investigator. But he said he trusted his judgment. Vaz said: “This is becoming like a John le Carre novel.

“You appoint someone to do an investigation who you say is a terrific guy. They go off and conduct the investigation.

“You are asking a committee of Parliament to rely on your good faith in choosing this person and the report that they have written.”